A hallmark of Avalanche teams the past few seasons was to serve as a pick-me-up for opponents with bad records. If any team had no right to take anyone lightly it was the Avs but they did it a lot and it cost plenty.

The Avs came into the First Niagara Center on Saturday night and left sympathy back at the team hotel. They posted a 4-2 victory over the Buffalo Sabres who entered the game with one win.

Colorado atoned for its first loss of the season Thursday and improved its red-hot record to 7-1.

Gabriel Landeskog of the Colorado Avalanche scores past Ryan Miller of the Buffalo Sabres at First Niagara Center. (Jen Fuller Getty Images)"Our saying in here is: We don't lose two in a row" said Avalanche center Matt Duchene who was excellent with a goal and assist. "We wanted to bounce back from that first loss and we came out with the kind of start we wanted. We kind of smothered them early took the life out of them. They came back a bit and we don't like that but it's going to happen it's the NHL. There are things will still need to work on."

Ryan O'Reilly and Gabe Lan- deskog scored in the game's first 12 minutes and the Avs had a 4-1 lead by the midpoint of the second period on Paul Stastny's first goal of the season before pulling back a lot to play it safe.

The Avs held Buffalo without a shot for the first 13 minutes getting 12 themselves. When the Sabres got their first shot at about the 13:30 mark a huge Bronx cheer went up from disgruntled fans.